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Ubuntu to get visual refresh with Hardy Heron

During the theme specification meeting at the Ubuntu Developer Summit, a …

Artists and developers participated in a desktop theming specification meeting at the Ubuntu Developer Summit earlier this week. During the meeting, participants made plans for the visual refresh of Hardy Heron, the next major release of the Ubuntu Linux distribution. The meeting was led by Ubuntu art director Kenneth Wimer, who explained that the goal for Hardy is to "radically change the artwork and the theming behind the entire desktop from boot all the way through to logout."

The new theme will evolve during the development cycle and will require careful planning so that all the pieces will be completed in time for the release. GTK theme engine development work, for instance, will have to be started earlier in the design process because it's more time intensive. The Ubuntu development community will likely select an existing theme engine on which to base Hardy's visual style. The two options that were discussed during the meeting were Clearlooks and Murrine.

The GTK theme

The Clearlooks-based Human theme engine is currently the default in the latest version of the GNOME desktop environment, which means that using it in Ubuntu would make the Ubuntu desktop more consistent with the look and feel of upstream GNOME. The Murrine theme engine is much more sophisticated and offers a wide range of nice features, such as glassy gradients and striped scrollbars. The meeting participants also discussed the potential for creating a GTK theme that leverages compositing capabilities. After a theme engine is selected, developers will have to create custom GTKRC files that establish Ubuntu's default color scheme. Hardy Heron will be moving away from Ubuntu's signature brown look in favor of black and orange.

The name of the theme will also probably be changed to reflect the significant deviation from the previous look and feel. The default Ubuntu theme has been called Human for a long time. "Superhuman" is one of the names that was proposed for the new theme.

New art for booting and login

Other artwork will be revamped as well. New installer and boot splash pictures will be created. Coders will have to help with the usplash development efforts to better support more screen ratios. The possibility of replacing usplash with a temporary X server was also discussed, but that approach is not likely to be adopted for Hardy. An important goal is increasing the consistency and fluidity of the boot and login process by making the usplash and the GDM login themes match, for instance. The GDM login theme is being redesigned by bling expert Mirco Muller and will use a new "face browser" by default rather than the traditional username text box.

Custom application splash screens will also be made for several desktop applications, including GIMP and OpenOffice.org. An Ubuntu Studio developer expressed some concerns about the difficulty of rebranding custom Ubuntu artwork and encouraged discussion of ways to improve the situation for application splash screens and other theme elements that are included in individual packages.

Icons and other details

The Hardy icon theme will be completely redone as well. For Hardy, the Ubuntu artists plan to use the Tango style guidelines and attempt to create icons that are more consistent with the Tango icon set used by upstream GNOME. A new cursor theme could possibly be created as well, but few details have been ironed out for that yet.

Many other details will have to be addressed as well. Wine's support for Windows theming is currently too buggy to be used by default, but if it is fixed within the next six months, then the Ubuntu developers might want to create a Windows theme that matches the default Ubuntu theme so that applications running in Wine will fit in with the rest of the system. Improved Firefox integration is another goal for Hardy Heron.

Kubuntu theming efforts will focus on KDE 3, but the developers plan to adopt the Oxygen theme for KDE 4, which will increase consistency with upstream. One of the goals for the Kubuntu community is to create a Kubuntu Amarok theme.

There are also some intriguing long-term plans for features like a system-wide theme switcher and support for allowing the user to choose their own global color scheme.

As Ubuntu's distinctive brown visual style evolves into a more modern look with orange and black, Ubuntu founder Mark Shuttleworth hopes to converge the style and appearance of the desktop and mobile Ubuntu environments. Although much work remains, the foundations have been set for Hardy theming.